Treaty of Peace between the French republic and the Infant Duke of Parma, Placentia, and Guastalla.

THE French republic and his royal highness the infant duke of Parma, Placentia, and Guastalla, defiring to re-establish the ties of amity which formerly subsisted between the two states, and to put an end, as much as in their power, to the calamities of war, have accepted, with eagerness, the mediation of his Catholic majesty, and have named for the plenipotentiaries, that is to say, the executive directory, in the name of the French epublic, the citizen Charles Delacroix, minifter of foreign affairs, and his royal highness the infant duke of Parma, Meffieurs the count Pierre Politi and Don Louis Boll; who, after having exchanged their respective powers, have determined upon and concluded definitively the following articles, under the mediation of his Catholic majesty, exercited by the marquis del Campo, his ambaffador to the French republic, who has also presented his full powers.

ART. I. There shall be peace and amity between the French republic and his royal highness the infant duke of Parma; the two powers shall carefully abstain from every thing that may alter the good harmony and union established between them by the present treaty.

2. Every act, engagement, or anterior convention, on the part of one or other of the two contracting powers, which might be contrary to the present treaty, shall be confidered as null and void. In confequence, during the course of the present war, neither of the two powers shall furnish to the enemies

of the other any fuccours in troops, arms, warlike ammunition, provi fions, or money, under whatever title and denomination it may be.

3. The infant duke of Parma engages not to permit the emigrants, or banished persons of the French republic, to stop or sojourn in his state.

4. The French republic and his royal highness the infant duke of Parma engage to remove the sequestration from all the effects, revenues, or goods, which may have been seized, confiscated, detained, or fold, from the citizens or fubjects of the other power, relative to the present war, and to admit them to the legal exercise of the actions or rights belonging to them.

5. The contributions stipulated in the convention of armistice, figned at Placentia on the 20th of last Floreal, between general Buonaparte in the name of the French republic, and the marquises Pelleviene and Phillippo delle Rosa in the name of the infant duke of Parma, shall be fully difcharged. There shall neither be levied nor exacted any other; if there have been levied any contributions in money, or required any supplies in provisions, beyond what is settled by the faid convention, the contributions in money thall be reimburfed, and the provisions paid for at the current price at the time of delivery. There shall be named on each part, if necessary, commiffaries to execute the present article.

6. From the fignature of the prefent treaty the states of his royal highness the infant duke of Parma shall be treated as those of friendly and neutral powers; if there shall be supplied any neceffaries to the troops

troops of the republic, by his royal highness or his fubjects, they fhall be paid for at a price agreed upon. 7. The troops of the republic shall enjoy a free paffage through the states of the infant duke of Parma.

8. One of the contracting powers fhall not grant a free paffage to the troops of the enemy of the other.

9. The French republic and his royal highness the infant duke of Parma defiring to establish and augment by ftipulations, reciprocally advantageous, the commercial. relations that exifted between their citizens and respective subjects, determined as follows:

10. Silks, grain, rice, olive oil, cattle, cheese, wines, and other articles, the produce of the effates of his royal highness, shall be exported to the territories of the republic without any reftrictions beyond those which the exigencies of the country may render neceffary. The faid reftrictions shall never attach folely and especially upon the French citizen. There shall even be granted every degree of preference for the purchase of the objects (mentioned or alluded to in the present article) of which circumstances may fufpend or restrain the exportation.

11. All articles being the produce of the republic, its colonies or fisheries, shall be imported, free of duty, into the states of his royal highness, and exported from France, fubject only to fuch restrictions as local circumftances may render neceffary.

:

12. All articles of French manufacture shall likewife be imported to the ftates of his royal highness, unless he may deem it expedient, for the profperity of his own ma

nufactures, to impose certain restrictions or prohibitions; but these reftrictions shall in no case operate againft French manufactures exclufively, to which his royal highness even undertakes to give all the preference he can confiftently with the profperity of the manufactures of his own states.

The above articles fhall be executed with the most scrupulous reciprocity for the introduction of the manufactures of his royal highneis's ftates into France..

13. The mutual duties on ex-. ports and imports shall be regulated by a feparate convention: in cafe that fuch convention should not be ratified by the republic, it is expressly agreed that the faid duties shall be reciprocally afcertained and collected in the mode obferved with the countries the moft favoured by the republic.

14. The produce of the lands of the republic, her colonies and fisheries, shall be conveyed freely through the states of his royal highness, or lodged in warehouses on their way to the other states of Italy, without the payment of customs, and liable only to a certain toll on their passage, for the support of the highways; which thall be regulated with all possible dispatch, and founded on a moderate footing between the contracting parties, at so much per quintal per league. The toll shall be payable at the first office for entering the goods.

The above article shall alfo be in force in all parts of the republic; and all goods and merchandise the produce of the states of his royal highness the infant duke of Parma shall be subject to the fame regulations as above. And,

As the right of toll above mentioned has been retained only with a view to contribute to the support of the bridges and highways, it is expressly ftipulated that the goods and merchandise conveyed by the rivers and navigable canals shall be reciprocally exempt from duties of every description.

II. On all goods and merchandife, the produce of the republic on being exported for the states of his royal highness.

Done at Paris, the day and year as above.

(Signed)

CH. DELACROIX. COUNT POLITE LOUIS BOLLA.

present and preceding articles.

15. In conformity to the fixth article of the treaty concluded at the Hague, the 22d Floreal, 3d year, the peace concluded by the present treaty is declared common with the Batavian republic.

16. The present treaty shall be ratified, and the ratifications exchanged in one month at most from the present day, exclusively.

Done at Paris, in the 5th year of the French republic, one and indivisible.

SEPARATE ARTICLE.

His royal highness stipulates to grant a remiflion of one-fourth of the rights of importation on the goods and merchandise, being the produce of the republic, her colonies, fisheries, and manufactures, destined for the home confumption of the states, and also the right of exportation on the goods and merchandise, the produce of the ftates, and destined for the foreign poffeffions of the republic; provided the French republic agree to a reciprocal diminution of duties.

I. On the goods and merchandife arifing from the states of his royal higbness, at their entry on the territory of the republic.

Raymond, M. Giraud, G. Leblanch, and P. Romme, Commissioners delegated by the French Government to the Windward Islands of St. Domingo. To all the Citizens of the Colony,

and to all those who compose the Land and Sea Forces dettined for its defence.

a

CITIZENS, AFTER fo many forms and critical emergencies, infeparable concomitants of revolution, France enjoys at last a constitution worthy of a people who know how to value liberty.

Already under a truly republican government, the French people begin to reft from their long and arduous toil, and to enjoy the happy effects of the liberty which they have attained.

Firmly refolved to cause the constitution to be executed, the Exccutive Directory is conftantly employed in searching out means to have it established in all parts of the Republic.

The fixth article of the conftitution states, That the French colonies are inseparable parts of the Republic, and subjected to the fame constitutional law.

It is particularly for the execution of that article, that we have received from the government the honourable mission intrusted to us; and, at the fame time, to let you know know all the means you ought to employ to preserve liberty and equality, which are the fundamental laws of the conftitution.

Citizens rally at the voice of the delegates of the republic, fince it is in her name, and for her dearest interefis, that they are going to address you.

The ancient government of the colonies had diftinguished three different claffes-the whites, the coloured people, and the flaves. To those different classes, now united and honoured with the name of French citizens, we are going to speak alternately. We shall first address that portion of the people of the colony, which has most suffered under the tyrannic order which has been abolished, and we shall say to them: By the republican conftitution, which the French nation has just adopted, you have recovered your primitive rights; but you must know the proper means to preferve them without trouble, and to tranfmit them without interruption, to your remoteft pofterity. Those ships, the warriors whom they bring to you; all those formidable preparations are designed against the English, who are the most cruel enemies of your liberty! They dare to indulge the hope of framing new chains for you. See these blood-thirsty tygers bending ftill your brethren under their homicidal whips. We cannot fuffer any longer so dismal an object; join the forces which France sends to you, expel from the territory of the French republic those tyrants of mankind, pursue them even to their haunts, and destroy the last of them! What! is it not incumbent on you to revenge your bre

thren, whom they keep fettered in the surrounding islands? Yes, citizens, every thing ought to impress you with an implacable hatred for those tyrants, whose most lucrative trade is, reducing you to flavery, misery, and death. What can withhold your vengeance? Ruth on this impious race; make it difappear from that sacred spot, which too long has been the theatre of its crimes and depredations.

Labour and instruction, citizens, are neceffary to the preservation of the people, and the conftitution imposes them as a duty upon all citizens. The 15th article of the second title contains these words. Young men cannot be inscribed in the civic register, if they do not prove that they can read, write, and follow a mechanical branch of business. That clause, citizens, can and ought to take place only agreeably to the constitution, after the first day of the 12th year of the republic.

The manual operations of agriculture belong to the mechanic arts.

Yes, labour and agriculture particularly, is absolutely necessary to him who wishes to preserve his rights, and enjoy his liberty. Through labour we procure the neceffary things to our existence and enjoyment; through labour only we can preserve our liberty.

Had your ancestors, the inhabitants of Africa, devoted themselves to the culture of their fruitful lands, they most assuredly would not have debased themselves by reciprocal bloody wars, of which greedy Europeans have availed themselves to reduce them to the most intolerable and degrading Aavery.

What remains for

you to do, in order to avoid all the misfortunes which are infeparable concomitants of idleness? Nothing, but to devote your selves to the culture of the rich productions of the colony you inhabit! Many of you have been to France; they will tell you, that the people are there conftantly occupied at useful labours, and agriculture in particular. Imitate that active people, who adopts you as brethren, and you will establith by that means, a trade of exchange with them, which will cement and strengthen your brotherly relations.

Instruction is as useful to you as labour; by it you will tranfmit your rights to your children; by it you will learn how to fulfil the duty of good citizens: finally, by instruction you will attain that degree of morality, which diftinguishes the civilized from the favage man, the honeft from the perverfe citizen.

The government will omit nothing to attain an object so interefting, and fo worthy of its folicitude. Public fchools will be established throughout all the colonies; your children shall there receive inftruction; imbibe a taste for labour and morals, which are to accomplish their full generation. The republic will extend farther her cares for your children, for the wishes that a certain number of those who shall have produced a greater difpofition and zeal for instruction be sent to France, with the confent of their parents, there to study in a more perfect degree thefe iciences or arts, to which they may have shewn a more decided inclination.

The fame resources are likewise offered to the children of the whites, and of the coloured people; for the primary schools, which will be established, will be open to all individuals, born in the colonies, of whatever colour they may be. ALL MEN ARE EQUAL IN

RIGHTS.

To you, Citizens, whom a barbarons custom had made formerly proprietors of flaves, we shall obferve, that in consequence only of the most strange fubverfion of what is known under the name of justice and humanity, the most sacred rights of man had been foríaken in the former order of things, which allowed them to be reduced to the most infufferable and abje& flavery; we shall tell you that a state so contrary to nature, though apparently favourable to your interefts, was of too violent a nature to laft long. Fow could the mafter shake off the thought of the dangers with which he was inceffantly threatened? Does not the experience of ages and nations, tranfmitted by history, inform us, that tyranny has always fallen a victim to its own crimes? Undoubtedly, fix hundred thousand slaves, unjustly and cruely tortured, in almost every inftant of their lives, could not afford a great degree of security to the small number of their matters. They were most assuredly disturbed by the most cruel enormities.

Instead of the violent ftate in which lingered the late proprietors of flaves, liberty and equality, which flow from the conftitution, offer to them nothing but true enjoyments, and perfect security to their lives and fortunes.

In addressing those formerly dif tinguished